Seminario San Buenaventura

Beautiful building of the Buenaventura Seminary, located in one of the most active tourist areas of Mérida, this seminar is of great importance for the Catholic Church in Venezuela.

Colonial structure, good location. Great trainers

Excellent, a great building with all the necessary elements for the formation of future Priests ... "Lord give us many Holy Priests"

One of the first orders of the founding bishop of the Diocese of Mérida, Fray Juan Ramos de Lora, was to erect the house that had been a Franciscan convent; a House of Studies where to admit young people inclined to the clerical state, according to the demands of the Tridentine Council. To this end, he issued the constitutions of the Institute on March 29, 1785, the original date of the Tridentine Seminary and the University of Mérida. King Carlos III approved said erection on September 14, 1786. On March 20, 1789, he approved the institution with the title of Royal Seminary of San Buenaventura, affiliated with the University of Caracas for the purpose of granting degrees. By the end of June 1790, the factory of the new seminary was completed and its installation was verified on November 2 of the same year, in a solemn act in which it imposed scholarships to the first schoolboys. Thanks to the efforts of Bishop Santiago Hernández Milanés, by Royal Decree of June 18, 1806, King Carlos IV granted the Seminary of San Buenaventura de Mérida the grace to confer minor and major degrees in philosophy, theology and canon law, with the same value as those received at the universities of Caracas and Santa Fe. The Superior Board of Mérida elevated the Seminary, on September 21, 1810, to the category of university with the title of Royal University of San Buenaventura de Mérida de los Caballeros, with all the privileges of that of Caracas. And with the faculty of conferring all major and minor degrees in philosophy, medicine, civil and canon law and in theology. Its first rector was Fr. Buenaventura Arias. During the difficult years of the War of Independence, the seminary was transferred, in 1813, to the city of Maracaibo. However, as of 1816, with the limitations of the circumstances, it functioned in Mérida under the rectory of Priest Arias, until its total restitution in Mérida by Bishop Rafael Lasso de la Vega, in 1821. Republican life is marked by the beginning of the process of separation of the internal regime of the seminary and the university, although ecclesiastical studies were part of the university pensum. The first rector in this new period is Fr. Ignacio Fernández Peña in 1832. Already in the bishopric of Mons. Juan Hilario Bosset (1841-1873) the university authorities are different from those of the Seminary, having the academic part as a bond of union. From January 1912 to July 1914 the Saint Bonaventure Seminary was under the direction of the Dutch Dominican Fathers. From then until 1925 it was once again in the hands of the diocesan clergy. In that year, the Fathers of the Congregation of Jesus and Mary or Eudist Fathers were in charge of the formation of the Andean clergy. Archbishop Silva's joy was clouded by the provision that granted the Seminary of Caracas exclusive rights to the formation of major seminarians in Venezuela. Only between 1953 and 1960 did the Major Seminary function. The Eudist Fathers remained until 1971, the year in which the diocesan clergy took over the leadership. In 1979, under the pontificate of Bishop Miguel Antonio Salas, the Eudist Fathers returned to take charge of the seminary together with some diocesan priests. Starting in 1983, the Major Seminary was restored with the complete cycle of philosophical and theological studies. In 1988 the first group of seminarians was ordained who did all their ecclesiastical studies in the old house of San Buenaventura. The current premises of the Seminary were solemnly inaugurated in 1958, the year of the city's four-hundredth anniversary.

The Seminary "San Buenaventura" of Mérida is one of the oldest institutions in the city, dating from the time of the Colony founded by Fray Juan Ramos de Lora, first bishop of the City. The current structure is a little over 50 years old. In him the future priests of the Archdiocese of Mérida and neighboring dioceses are formed.